Not a lot of stories use the second person singular perspective. Fewer use the second person plural. But this is the primary perspective of dungeon-delving modules, Chtulhian investigations, and space-faring adventures. Few adventures within Dungeon Magazine's comes with boxtext, and most of this boxtext comes at the …

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BIND's rules have split into 'basic' and 'not-so-basic'. But now the divide has shifted again, this time without planning or care, just naturally. The 'basic' rules became 'must-have', or 'must-do', and the rest has shifted to rules which answer questions. Examples: "Roll for actions when there is a danger of something …

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Chaotician Writer of Mastodon asked, if zany encounter tables are boring , what makes a good encounter table? ' Return to White Plume Mountain ' makes a good encounter table, because: It's fast, grounded, repeatable, and it develops. White Plume Wandering Monster Table The first set is rolled Outside the mountain. The …

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I've been thinking about different structures for encounter tables. Highest & Lowest Roll 2D6 and check the highest and lowest scores: Highest Encounter Lowest Reaction No. 6 Military Unit 6 Ignore 1D6 x 20 5 Adventurers 5 Neutral 1D6 4 Giant 4 Attack! 1D6 3 Elves 3 Stalk 2D6 2 Trader 2 Friendly 2D6 1 Deer 1 Flees 2D6 …

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If I had to make a spell-system for Oglaf , it would be this: You can only cast spells with a level equal or higher than the last spell you cast. Once you cast a spell, you cannot cast it again for a number of rounds equal to its level. You want to cast Fireball? Let's warm up with a cantrip first. Yea, Burning Hands …

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Using action points instead of initiative has been great. It works like this: Just Go! We just start, then whoever said they hit the bartender spends an Action Point. Most characters have 3. Once everyone's spent their Action Points, a new round begins. The table doesn't have that feeling of 'combat!, wait, no, roll …

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Reviewing RPGs seems unreasonable work. Far too many have tried their hand at the seemingly-easy task of writing one, and even worse: sometimes writing really is that easy. Vampire: The Masquerade's first 'edition' looks like a series of short stories, but it had plenty of fresh ideas in there. Gamers, GMs, and writers …

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Random tables of D100 zany-silly things that might happen in your adventure need to cease, because they've stepped out of bounds. I get the motivation: emergent stories are great, it's what the game's all about. dice are great at 'emerging' those elements which become the story - the random challenge, the unexpected …

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The most important things you should do to improve your GMing skills depend on you: they are unique or rare. Generic 'how to GM' articles and books will not help with anything unique to you. So generic 'how to GM' writing do not contain the most important advice. If I could go back in time and give younger self only …

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All rules are bad, but many are necessary. A game about travel without rules for carrying things just forces the GM to come up with rules on the fly. But needing rules to resolve a lot of situations doesn't mean a lot rules. Designers can cheat by folding rules over each other, so they cover more area, without taking …

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